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Silver Nanoparticles Affect Arabidopsis thaliana Leaf Tissue Integrity and Suppress Pseudomonas syringae Infection Symptoms in a Dose-Dependent Manner

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Abstract

Pathogens are a major threat of plant-based production. Expanding restrictions for the use of classical pesticides is increasing the need of alternative applications to control plant diseases. Nanoparticles have recently received increasing research interest as a potential means to protect plants from adverse conditions including pathogen attack. To assess the beneficial potential of silver nanoparticles to protect plants against the bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas syringae, of which numerous economically relevant pathovars are known, we evaluated the effect of silver nanoparticle pre-treatment in the model pathosystem Arabidopsis thaliana–P. syringae. For this purpose, A. thaliana leaves were treated with different silver nanoparticle concentrations prior to P. syringae infection and visible alterations of the leaf tissue in relation to the individual and combined treatments were scored. While treatment with silver nanoparticles in the concentration range between 0.5 and 10 ppm suppressed P. syringae symptom development, concentrations above 5 ppm caused necroses and chloroses in a dose-dependent manner. This indicates that silver nanoparticles affect plant physiological processes related to cell and tissue integrity that are also associated with the development of infection symptoms caused by P. syringae. Therefore, silver nanoparticle treatments in a suitable concentration range support the maintenance of tissue integrity during pathogen infection in combination with their antimicrobial activity, thus preventing loss of biomass. This makes silver nanoparticles a promising tool for integrative crop protection strategies in commercial production.

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Data Availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Abbreviations

dpi:

days post infection

NPs:

Nanoparticles

PAR:

Photosynthetically Active Radiation

Pto :

Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank prof. Christian Andreasen, Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of Copenhagen, for providing greenhouse facilities.

Funding

KP was part of the EU COST ACTION FA1306 grant for Short-Term Scientific Missions (STSM) to Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of Copenhagen. Silver nanoparticles purchase was supported by the Hungarian grant no. TÁMOP-4.1.1.C-13/1/KONV-2014–0001. TR would like to acknowledge funding by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of CR within the National Sustainability Program I (NPU I), grant number LO1415.

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Author notes

  1. Kenny Paul and Dominik K. Großkinsky contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Højbakkegård Allé 13, 2630, Taastrup, Denmark

    Kenny Paul, Dominik K. Großkinsky & Thomas Roitsch

  2. Institute of Plant Biology, Biological Research Center, Eötvös Lóránd Research Network, Temesvári krt. 62. Szeged, Budapest, 6726, Hungary

    Kenny Paul & Imre Vass

  3. Reliance Research and Development Centre, Reliance Corporate Park, Thane-Belapur Road, Navi Mumbai, 400701, India

    Kenny Paul

  4. Center for Health and Bioresources, AIT Austrian Institute of Technology GmbH, Bioresources Unit, Konrad-Lorenz-Straße 24, Tulln an der Donau, Austria

    Dominik K. Großkinsky

  5. Department of Adaptive Biotechnologies, Global Change Research Institute, Czech Academy of Sciences, Brno, Czech Republic

    Thomas Roitsch

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  1. Kenny Paul
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KP and DKG designed and carried out the experiments, analyzed the data, and drafted the manuscript. All authors contributed to interpreting the data, writing the manuscript, and approving its final version for publication.

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Correspondence to Thomas Roitsch.

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Paul, K., Großkinsky, D.K., Vass, I. et al. Silver Nanoparticles Affect Arabidopsis thaliana Leaf Tissue Integrity and Suppress Pseudomonas syringae Infection Symptoms in a Dose-Dependent Manner. BioNanoSci. 12, 332–338 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12668-022-00957-3

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